


If the World was Ending

by XtinaJones91



Category: Women's Soccer RPF
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Best Friends, Denial of Feelings, Developing Relationship, Drama & Romance, Earthquakes, End of the World, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Idiots in Love, One Night Stands, Phone Calls & Telephones, Pining, Revelations, Romance, Soran - Freeform, Voicemail
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:53:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22236058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XtinaJones91/pseuds/XtinaJones91
Summary: An earthquake hits Portland and it leads to some slightly dramatic confessions from both Emily and Lindsey as they realize life's too short for regrets and the world could end at any moment.This is the result of a plot bunny that wouldn't leave my head when I heard the song of the same name by JP Saxe and Julia Michaels.
Relationships: Lindsey Horan/Emily Sonnett
Comments: 7
Kudos: 96





	If the World was Ending

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not entirely sure how we got here, but I've been reading way too much Soran fic and then the Portland-Orlando trade happened and I've been obsessed with this song since the moment I heard it and had to write something based on it and these two idiots seemed to fit it.
> 
> I have no idea if Portland is geologically capable of experiencing an earthquake of the magnitude I have randomly chosen, but that's why this is fiction. 
> 
> The song the title and plot bunny came from is "If the World was Ending" by JP Saxe and Julia Michaels. I HIGHLY recommend listening to this song before, during, and after reading this. You can check out the music video here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jO2wSpAoxA
> 
> Enjoy.

_ I was distracted _

_ And in traffic _

_ I didn't feel it _

_ When the earthquake happened _

_ But it really got me thinkin' _

_ Were you out drinkin' _

_ Were you in the living room _

_ Chillin' watchin' television _

_ It's been a year now _

_ Think I've figured out how _

_ How to let you go and let communication die out _

_ I know, you know, we know, you weren't down for forever and it's fine _

_ I know, you know, we know, we weren't meant for each other and it's fine _

_ But if the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ You'd come over and you'd stay the night _

_ Would you love me for the hell of it _

_ All our fears would be irrelevant _

_ If the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ The sky'd be falling and I'd hold you tight _

_ And there wouldn't be a reason why _

_ We would even have to say goodbye _

_ If the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ Right? _

_ If the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ Right? _

* * *

  
  


Lindsey is stuck in traffic, slowly making her way back to Portland from Seattle and questioning her decision to drive, when the alert comes across her phone and disrupts the road trip playlist Emily had made for them once when they'd taken a trip down the Oregonian coast. That seems so long ago now, like it happened to different people, and she tries not to think about why that is and why things have changed between them so much in the last year.

The alert is jarring and persistent, one of those severe weather ones that buzzes and shrills for several long seconds. She looks up at the clear blue sky, puzzled by why she's getting the warning in the first place and then she scans the text of the alert and her body freezes.

Displayed on her phone in capital, bold red text are words she never thought she'd read:

4.5 MAGNITUDE EARTHQUAKE HITS PORTLAND. SEEK SHELTER IMMEDIATELY. 

Her phone starts pinging with more news alerts about the earthquake and texts from her parents and some of her friends wondering where she is and if she's okay, and she realizes that her hands are shaking so she carefully maneuvers through traffic to the highway shoulder and pulls over. She's still thinking clearly enough to put on her hazards when she throws her car in park and yanks her phone from the mount on her dash.

She types out a quick response to her parents to let them know she's okay and where she is. She rapidly scans the list of people who've messaged her looking for a particular person and her heart drops when she doesn't see Emily's name among them. She scrolls through her message history until she sees "DASANI" followed by a soccer ball, rose, heart, and muscle flex emoji and she realizes that they haven't texted each other at all since she left for Seattle.

She pulls up their text thread and starts to type out a message but can't form the right words and instead smashes her thumb on the call button. She needs to hear Emily's voice more than anything she's needed in a long time. There's an anxious desperation clawing at her chest as she waits for the phone to ring and she wonders where Emily is right now, if she’s scared, if she’s alone, if she’s hurt, if she’s - 

Her spiraling train of thought is cut off by the immediate transition of her call from one dial straight to voicemail. Emily's voice fills her ear as the latest iteration of her voicemail message plays.

_ "You've reached Saucy Sonny, sit down comedian and meme lord." _

"Damnit, Em," she curses under her breath.

_ "Sorry I missed ya but leave your digits and I'll hit you back when I'm done making gains at the gym." _

She rolls her eyes and huffs out a nervous breath, waiting for the message to end so she can finally speak. She thinks it's about to wrap up when Emily pauses, but then there's more.

_"And if this is Linessi, give me back my hoodie, you thief."_

She glances down at what she's currently wearing and it's the navy UVA hoodie she swiped from Emily a month ago. A month ago when she’d gone over to Emily’s place for the first time in what felt like forever. A month ago when they’d had a movie night like they used to. A month ago when she was able to look at Emily and mostly not think about that night instead of it being the only thing she could see whenever they made eye contact or touched or were in the same room.

A month ago when she realized that no matter how much she tried to distance herself from one Emily Sonnett it wasn’t going to make her feelings go away. Feelings that she couldn’t act on now, not with how badly she’d messed it all up, not with how she’d hurt Emily, jeopardized the team, and almost permanently ruined the most important friendship she’s ever had. 

But here she was about to risk it all. Because a freaking _ earthquake _ had hit Portland, and Emily was there somewhere in the city, probably in her apartment binging one of her many Netflix shows or watching the weekend Premier League matches or maybe out for brunch with their friends having mimosas with their avocado toast because it was their bye week and they could let go just a little. Or maybe she was at home or out on the town with someone else. Someone who wasn’t her because she was a coward and a fool and didn’t deserve a person as good as Emily.

All of this races through her mind as the voicemail message ends for real this time and prompts her with a beep that she doesn’t register for several seconds. When she does finally speak it’s in short, rushed sentences that run together. When she does start to speak it’s like she can’t stop and everything that she’s been holding in for a year finally spills out.

“Em,” she begins. “Emily. Sonnett. Sonny. Please tell me you’re okay, wherever you are right now. Just shoot me a text or something or tweet or post on Insta or anything, so I know you’re alive and not like trapped in your apartment and stuck under something. I’m honestly surprised you’re not livestreaming your earthquake experience right now. It would make for some great content. Super memeable. And you love memes. And I love your memes, even though I don’t understand most of them and a lot of them are really dumb. But you’re so happy when you make them, and I love when you’re happy. Because that means you’re smiling and probably also laughing, and those are maybe two of my favorite things in the whole world. Did you know that?  
No, of course you don’t know that. I’m an idiot, Em. For not telling you. I should’ve told you that night. Or every day before and every day since. I love your smile and your laugh and your eyes and your ridiculous dances and your Adidas hats and being your bus buddy and our handshake and getting to play beside you and how Waffle House is your favorite place and the way you always make me feel like I’m good enough. I love all of it, Emily. I love all of _ you_.”

She inhales and goes on because the words are out there now and she really has nothing left to lose and maybe Emily won’t even get this message and she can pretend this entire moment never happened.

“I know it’s unfair of me to say that after what I did, but it’s the truth and I needed you to hear it even if it’s too late. I don’t deserve you, Em. I never have. But I swear I’m gonna spend the rest of my life trying to be the friend that you deserve, even if it kills me to know I’ll never get to have you the way that I want to. I can’t lose you. And I’ll always -”

The end of the recording beeps and stops her before she can finish her final sentence.  
  
“Love you,” she exhales on a sigh, the words fading into the quiet interior of her car.

She drops her phone into her coffee cup holder and leans her forehead against the steering wheel. 

“Fuck,” she curses in frustration and anxiety. That’s not how any of this was supposed to go. There wasn’t supposed to be a random earthquake in Portland. She wasn’t supposed to be apart from Emily when it happened. Emily who can’t do most basic human functions without prodding and assistance on a good day let alone when there’s a crisis. Emily who would subsist off of cereal and pop-tarts if Lindsey didn’t drag her grocery shopping.

Emily who she just left a half-crazed rambling message for confessing her unrequited love. Emily who will probably never speak to her again after that, who she is lucky even speaks to her now when she has every right not to. Emily who didn’t deserve Lindsey fleeing the morning after and running back to her ex and acting like what happened between them was a mistake that they should forget and never repeat. 

Emily whose heart she so cruelly broke because of her own selfish cowardice.

“Fuck,” she says again, and hits her head against her hands.

She needs to get back to Portland. She needs to see Emily. She needs to do this right in case she never gets another chance.

She may not have felt the earthquake when it hit, but Lindsey’s world is still shaken all the same.

* * *

  
  


_ I tried to imagine _

_ Your reaction _

_ It didn't scare me when the earthquake happened _

_ But it really got me thinkin' _

_ That night we went drinkin' _

_ Stumbled in the house _

_ And didn't make it past the kitchen _

_ Ah it's been a year now _

_ Think I've figured out how _

_ How to think about you without it rippin' my heart out _

_ I know, you know, we know, you weren't down for forever and it's fine _

_ I know, you know, we know, we weren't meant for each other and it's fine _

_ But if the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ You'd come over and you'd stay the night _

_ Would you love me for the hell of it _

_ All our fears would be irrelevant _

_ If the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ The sky'd be falling while I'd hold you tight _

_ No there wouldn't be a reason why _

_ We would even have to say goodbye _

_ If the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ You'd come over right _

_ You'd come over, you'd come over, you'd come over right _

* * *

  
Emily is home alone when the earthquake hits Portland. She doesn’t understand what’s happening at first when the Premier League game on her TV goes fuzzy and then cuts out and the couch and the room are suddenly all shaking and not stopping and she jolts up and can feel the floor vibrate beneath her feet and what the fuck is happening right now?

She grabs her buzzing phone off the trembling coffee table and crawls across the floor to her kitchen table, her brain latching onto something she saw on a Discovery Channel disaster show once. Duck and cover, she thinks. She drags a blanket from her couch along with her and wraps it around herself like a hooded shawl.

The tremors stop after several minutes while she crouches under the table, fists clenched in the fabric of the blanket while she prays.

“Holy shit,” she whispers under her breath. “Holy shit.”  
  
And then the aftershock comes and she’s pretty sure she lets out a yelp as she braces herself under the table and waits for it to pass. She counts to ten, then twenty, then thirty, then just keeps going until it’s over.

When the earth seems to settle she stops counting and breathes in and out a little shakily. Her phone is clutched in her sweaty palm and she doesn’t know what the fuck is happening right now or if another quake is going to hit or if she’s going to die here, alone, under her kitchen table. Later she’ll realize that this was an unnecessarily dramatic thought, but in the moment she’s not thinking rationally.

She doesn’t want it to end like this. Not without saying what she needs to say to one particular person. The one persons she wishes was here with her right now because she’d know what to do, how to handle this and how to be calm about it. 

She swipes open her phone and taps to the first number on her speed dial. She doesn’t even know if the call is going to go through but she has to try. She has to say it in case this is her last day on earth, in case the world is actually ending and she never gets another shot.

Her phone rings and rings and rings and she’s sure the connection will drop, shocked there even is one considering her power seems to have gone out, but then finally it goes through and _ thank God_.

“Please pick up, please pick up, please pick up” she mutters.

The call goes to voicemail and she’s actually a little bit relieved. She’s not as brave as she’s desperately trying to be right now. The familiar message that she’s heard hundreds of time over the last several years plays through her phone where it’s pressed to her ear and her heart pounds in her chest when she hears the beep that tells her now is her time - now is her chance to speak.

“_Linds_,” she exhales shakily into her phone. “Linds, there was a freaking _ earthquake _ and I don’t know where you are and I’m hiding under my kitchen table and maybe this is the start of the zombie apocalypse and we’re all gonna die. But I really hope not. I really hope I don’t die because…” she pauses and inhales.  
  
“Because I love you, Lindsey. I’m in love with you and I think I always have been And I know you don’t - I know you don’t love me back and that’s okay. It’s okay. I’ve learned to live with that and our friendship means so much to me. You’re my very best friend, Linessi. And I know things got messed up for awhile...after that night. But they’re good again now, and I’m so glad that they are, which is why I also know that it’s stupid of me to say this at all. But I had to, Linds. And I think you’ll understand why. Or at least I hope you’ll understand. Hell, you probably won’t even get this message anyways so it doesn’t even matter.”

She pauses again and changes the direction of the conversation reverting to joking like she always does when she can’t cope with the weight of what she feels.

“If I survive this I’m gonna make so many earthquake memes. The possibilities are endless,” she chuckles into the phone but it’s half-hearted and she grows serious again.  
  
“I hope you’re safe, wherever you are right now. I guess I’ll see you later when you get back from Seattle. Be careful, Lindsey. And I -”  
  
Lindsey’s voicemail service cuts her off and she sinks back against the wall, her hands shaking but not from fear of the earthquake. She stares at her phone and wonders why she did that and then wonders how she’s alive and then wonders what the hell she’s supposed to do now. They don’t teach you how to deal with this kind of shit in college. And Georgia sure as hell didn’t have earthquakes.

She wonders next what Kelley would do in a situation like this and decides the appropriate answer is drink a beer. She slowly, cautiously comes out from her shelter under the table, steps carefully through her living room and into her kitchen where everything on the counters has jostled and shifted and she’s sure there’s broken dishes in her cupboards but she’ll deal with that later. She opens the fridge and pulls out the six-pack she’s been saving for this bye week they have in the middle of the season, the six-pack she saved thinking she’d invite Lindsey over and they’d split it while watching a movie or trashy reality show or Grey’s Anatomy (for like the fifth time because Lindsey loves it and she can’t say no to Lindsey).

She has to move a bunch of stuff out of the way that fell off the shelves and she should probably eat some of the random assortment of food she has before it spoils now that the power is out. She piles up some cheese and yogurt and grapes and baby carrots and hummus on a plate and carries it back into the living room with the six pack dangling from her fingers.

She can’t watch TV and she can’t use her phone to stream anything because it’ll die and she has no way to charge it, but she plops down onto the couch anyway and cracks open a beer. She’s a few sips in, mindlessly staring at the wall, when she gets an idea. Several moments later she has her drawing pad and pencils out on the coffee table and she starts to sketch.

She draws and draws and draws until she’s three beers in and all her snacks are gone and the early evening light is coming through the windows but it’s still mostly dark in her apartment. Her hand is cramping and she’s tired and a little tipsy so she puts down her pencil to curl up on the couch and take a nap.

She only plans to sleep for like thirty minutes tops, but she had an eventful day and the beer hit her harder than she realized and she sleeps until it’s full dark out. She’s so deep in sleep that she doesn’t hear her front door open, doesn’t hear her name being called somewhat frantically, doesn’t hear the hurried footsteps approaching her, doesn’t have any clue that Lindsey is in her apartment until Lindsey is on the floor kneeling in front of her couch and brushing back strands of loose hair that fell free from her messy bun earlier while she was drawing.

Even then she still isn’t fully aware of Lindsey’s presence, her head fuzzy as she blinks her eyes open slowly and squints against the lights that have apparently come back on while she was asleep. There’s a weight on her upper arm and she glances down to a find a familiar hand resting there and she tracks her gaze upward until she’s met with the clear blue eyes of her best friend.

Lindsey’s eyes are soft and fond and crinkling at the edges in that way Emily has always found to be cute. Her inexplicable presence here, in Emily’s apartment, is at once both welcome and disorienting, an emotional dichotomy she’s all too familiar with when it comes to the woman in front of her.

“Hey,” Lindsey rasps, breaking the silence.

“Uh, hey” she responds and pushes herself into an upright position on the couch. She runs a hand through her tousled hair and tries to tame the escaped flyaways while Lindsey watches and doesn’t move from her kneeling position on the floor.

“What are you doing here?” she questions, a little afraid to know the answer.

“Well, I heard there was an earthquake,” Lindsey explains, laughter sparkling in her eyes. “And I came to check on you, to make sure you were okay because you weren’t answering any of my calls or texts and no one had heard from you.”

Calls. Lindsey has been calling her. Lindsey has been actively trying to reach her. Lindsey is here now because she needed to see for herself that Emily was alright. She doesn’t know what to do with all this information, her mind immediately jumping to her voicemail from earlier and whether or not Lindsey has listened to it.

“Yeah, it was pretty wild. My very first earthquake, and hopefully my last,” she tries to joke, but it comes out flatter than she intended. Lindsey laughs anyways.

“I hope so, too.”

Lindsey keeps looking at her strangely, her gaze intense but tender and more open than she’s used to seeing from her best friend and she doesn’t know what it means.

“Did you - did you get my voicemail?” she asks, her throat dry and her heart pounding as she blurts the words out because she can’t think about or do anything else until she knows for certain. 

“I did,” Lindsey nods, a small smile breaking in the corner of her mouth. “Did you get mine?”

“Did I - _ your _ message?” she’s trying to follow what’s happening but she’s still waking up and Lindsey got her message and she’s here right now, on the floor in Emily’s apartment with her hand resting on Emily’s knee like it’s a natural thing for her to do. Which it is, or at least, it was. Before.

“Yeah, I think we called each other at the same time,” Lindsey laughs quietly.

“Oh,” she exhales out, something between a breath and a laugh of her own. “I didn’t think you’d actually get it. And I put my phone on airplane mode to save battery, which I now realize was pretty dumb, and then I fell asleep and now you’re here and I haven’t checked my phone and - you listened to it?” she asks, gulping. “The whole thing?”

“The whole thing,” Lindsey answers, her smile widening and her eyes bright with that _ something _ Emily still can’t identify. It’s too much like the look Lindsey gave her right before they fell asleep on that night that nearly ruined everything.

“What was...what was _ your _ message?” Emily questions, her voice cracking slightly as she attempts to divert further discussion about the fact that Lindsey heard every word she said in that stupid voicemail she had to go and leave like an idiot.

“The same thing, more or less,” Lindsey replies with a nonchalant shrug that clears up nothing at all about what’s unfolding between them in this moment.

“Should I listen to it?” she suggests, her brow furrowing. It seems only fair for her to hear whatever it is that Lindsey left in her voicemail inbox, she thinks. Especially if it might help all this make sense - why Lindsey’s looking at her like that, why she’s here in the first place, why she’s touching Emily like it means something she can’t dare to hope for.

Lindsey shakes her head in the negative and inches closer to the couch. She’s very much in Emily’s personal space and Emily can smell the light floral perfume Lindsey wears that drives her insane every time she gets a whiff of it.

“Not right now.”  
  
“But -”  
  
“_Em_,” Lindsey cuts her off and her eyes widen. Lindsey never calls her that. Hasn’t called her that since that night they pretend didn’t happen.

“Yeah?” she whispers, voice low.

Lindsey reaches for her hands where they’re knotted tightly together in her lap. She gently untangles them and takes them in her own, thumbs brushing lightly across Emily’s knuckles. Lindsey’s touch does nothing to soothe her nerves; instead it ignites them even further and sets butterflies alight in her chest. She thinks she might die right here on this couch.

“You can listen to the message later, I promise. But right now - right now I really need to kiss you. Is that okay? Can I kiss you, Em?”

She swallows and nods, unable to form words. Her eyes lock with Lindsey’s as Lindsey braces herself against the couch, shifts her arms to bracket around Emily’s legs, and leans in.

At first Lindsey kisses her soft and slow, one hand still on the couch and the other reaching up to cup her cheek. It quickly turns needy and desperate when she pushes Emily back down onto the couch, swings her body up and over and straddles Emily’s waist. Then Lindsey kisses Emily like it’s her last day on earth and she might never get another chance. 

Emily eagerly responds and this is not at all how she thought this day was going to go - first she survives an earthquake and now she’s making out with her best friend, the love of her life who apparently loves her back according to the words she keeps whispering over and over into Emily’s neck and ear between kisses that grow sloppier and dirtier by the minute.

This wouldn’t be the worst way for the world to end, Emily thinks as Lindsey’s lips move lower and her hands move higher. No, this definitely isn’t a bad way to die at all.

* * *

  
  


_ I know, you know, we know, you weren't down for forever and it's fine _

_ I know, you know, we know, we weren't meant for each other and it's fine _

_ But if the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ You'd come over and you'd stay the night _

_ Would you love me for the hell of it _

_ All our fears would be irrelevant _

_ If the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ The sky'd be falling while I'd hold you tight _

_ No there wouldn't be a reason why _

_ We would even have to say goodbye _

_ If the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

_ You'd come over, you'd come over, you'd come over right _

_ If the world was ending _

_ You'd come over right _

**Author's Note:**

> Well....that happened :)
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this little bit of ridiculousness and please leave a kudos or comment if you did!
> 
> Or come find me on tumblr - tatooine-xtina


End file.
